Keir Starmer – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Keir Starmer on 2015-10-09.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference to paragraph 31 of the report by the House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee entitled The economics of HS2, published on 25 March 2015, what steps the Government has taken to estimate the overall reduction of cost to High Speed 2 of terminating the line at Old Oak Common, including any necessary redesign of the station at Old Oak Common to make this possible and calculate the effect on the project’s cost benefit analysis.

Mr Robert Goodwill

Terminating at Old Oak Common as an option was sifted out early in the decision making process for the London terminus given the weakness of the option, particularly in relation to its limited connectivity benefits. For this reason, the Government is not considering the option in any further detail and does not have cost estimates on a basis which would enable comparison with the preferred Euston terminus option. Euston is the best location for city centre connectivity and has the best onward transport connections to disperse passengers across London and it already has great London Underground connections on the Victoria and Northern lines and the Circle, Hammersmith & City and Metropolitan lines from Euston Square. The only way for onward travel from an Old Oak Common terminus would be Crossrail – any service interruption to Crossrail would potentially result in having to close HS2 as passengers would have no adequate alternative onward connection option. A Euston terminus is also essential for releasing capacity on the West Coast Mainline which is effectively full in terms of train paths.

In addition to not meeting our programme objectives, a terminus at Old Oak Common would still incur a number of significant costs. These include:

• Construction of a much larger HS2 station at the same depth as the Proposed Scheme (approximately 15m below ground level). A terminus station would need not only additional platforms but also additional servicing circulation and interchange facilities.
• Relocation of the Crossrail depot to the north of the station. No alternative location has been identified.
• It might be necessary to acquire properties in Hythe Road and divert the Grand Union Canal in order to provide sufficient space for the platforms and circulation around the station.
• A subterranean drive under tunnel to the west of the North London Line

Finally, it is worth noting that a very substantial part of the cost of the HS2 scheme at Euston is for Underground and other interchange facilities. These works will be necessary at some stage to serve the growing passenger demand at Euston that would occur irrespective of HS2.